


Undoing an Eclipse

by littledust



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-11-24
Updated: 2006-11-24
Packaged: 2017-10-17 21:50:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/181524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littledust/pseuds/littledust
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is one thing to whisper a secret in the dark to your best friend, quite another to live it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Undoing an Eclipse

**Author's Note:**

> Pinch hit for [](http://amber-firefox.livejournal.com/profile)[**amber_firefox**](http://amber-firefox.livejournal.com/) in [](http://community.livejournal.com/hp_lovebirds/profile)[**hp_lovebirds**](http://community.livejournal.com/hp_lovebirds/). This was a wonderful prompt to write.

Hermione cups her hands and lets her future fall through like grains of sand, a slow sad hourglass of impossibility. She is packing her things; she is almost ready to leave Hogwarts for what looks to be the last time. A year too early. Ginny sulked in corners all day yesterday and is nowhere to be found today. She puts on a front for Harry's sake, but the bitterness of being left behind lingers.

The bitterness of leaving, even more.

It's not that she doesn't love Harry, that she isn't doing this willingly, that she would stay behind while her loved ones fight ( _but not die, never die_ ). It's just. Just. Hermione never wanted to be a hero. She wanted (still wants) to be top in her class, to become Head Girl, to get a Good Job, to settle down with the Right Person, to make Amazing Discoveries, and to have a Wonderful Family. A, B, C, D, E, F. She will always have A but everything else goes tumbling away, the dots all unconnected and jumbled, soon to be lost.

Every tear is a waste of time. Hermione sniffs fiercely and zips her suitcase shut, a quick spell making it small enough to put in her pocket. She is sure that Harry and Ron will have forgotten about this and will be struggling to get their luggage down the stairs. Not that they will have much on the road, but Harry especially will not want to leave anything behind. Not when he's lost so much here already. Not when Professor Dumbledore...

Tears for Dumbledore are never wasted. Hermione allows herself a moment and then straightens, only to find Luna sitting on the edge of her bed, the usual serenity of her expression displaced by sadness. It doesn't seem at all strange that Luna is there, despite the Gryffindor bed hangings that nearly drown out the luminous quality of her eyes and hair.

"I haven't come to say goodbye," Luna says with her peculiar gravity, seriousness and the essential force of her world, keeping the Snorkacks from flying off into outer space.

"Luna," Hermione says, gentle as possible because she doesn't understand, "you can't come with us."

"I can." Her smile is quicksilver. "I'll give you something of me to carry."

And Luna

kisses

Hermione

like moonlight on leaves, all silver and glow.

It isn't exactly necessary for leaves, moonlight that is, but it's beautiful all the same, a quiet sort of dreamtime that Hermione can feel taking up space inside her, innocuous but _there_. It is a gift, to Hermione from Luna, and if she had the time she would consider the implications, but now she really has to go, it's late.

"Come back soon," Luna says.

Hermione flies down the stairs.

  
\--

  
It's dangerous work, being a diversion, but Hermione's heart is cold as she thinks of Harry, twenty miles away and by himself against whatever's guarding this particular Horcrux. She hates this more than anything else, hates being so good at distracting Death Eaters, making them think there are three when there is only one, or in this case two. Ron is still limping from their little adventure in Hungary, and if she is unhappy about not being with Harry, he is doubly so.

"I think it's the last of them for now," she pants, sitting down, her back against the little stone wall. Good defense, a place where protective magic laces the air. The people here must have believed in it, whatever people they are. Hermione is not quite sure what country they are in anymore, it might be anywhere.

Ron sits next to her and she leans on him, closing her eyes against the world. Not that it makes a difference, it's dark no matter where she looks, even if it's on the inside of her skull.

 _\--still, a piece of the moon--_

There is peace, in war, a peace of a time to rest, to let the adrenaline drain away to some other corner of the body. Hermione almost frowns at the thought. Her scientific knowledge has grown steadily more lax over the years. Is it enough to be a witch? They can be so backwards, think of the good magic and science could do together...

"I love you, you know," Ron says, his voice tired but the intention behind it so alive.

She stares at him, the faint outline in the darkness, the hair like a sunburst except there's only a faint glow in the night. The answer for Ron is always _yes_ but--

But--

There is an objection now. Or perhaps not quite an objection or an obstruction but just a difference, a new angle of looking at things.

First things first. "I love you, too," she says, and there are some tears, oh, still hasn't outgrown the silly habit. "Luna--"

He slings an arm around her, squeezes her shoulder. "Ginny hinted. I looked, and saw. I--whatever you need, Hermione. I just wanted to say it in case--"

"We'll never die, never!" Hermione cries, and bursts into tears.

She loves those boys with all her heart, her boys and the moon.

  
\--

  
It is one thing to whisper a secret in the dark to your best friend, quite another to live it. Ron and Harry nearly have to drag her back to Hogwarts to finish her seventh year, a little behind schedule but better late than never. She finally consents because Harry needs to go back, needs a bit of normalcy and another year in the place he calls home. Of course she needs similar things, but it's easier to do everything for everyone else before she starts on herself.

The whispering is everywhere. She cut off all her hair because there was no time for brushing anymore. Now her face is so open, so vulnerable to stray gazes. She wishes for Harry's glasses, for Ron's freckles. Anything to hide behind.

Books, of course.

November is dreary and cold, perfect reading weather, and classmates and teachers have stopped being so carefully kind, and the empty positions and seats have stopped looking so lonely and cold. Harry looks less like a starved skeleton and reports that Ron sleeps for hours at a stretch now. They're all healing.

Hermione pulls out the moon because she thinks it's safe, loses herself in lips and light. It's a charm, reconstructing the memory each time, a charm against sadness and pain. Their limbs were just so, and _her_ hands here and _her_ hands there, and the shadows slanted this way because it was early in the morning...

Does the moon cast a shadow?

Luna sits down, and she is carrying nothing of the sort of things people carry in libraries, like books or maps or perhaps chessboards. She has a chocolate egg, the sort of thing for Easter, but perhaps holiday conventions matter no more to Luna than everyday social conventions. In any case she offers it to Hermione.

"I don't really like--"

\--girls--

"--chocolate."

(Both are lies.)

When Luna says, "But you'll eat it anyway" it is an accusation.

Hermione is guilty.

  
\--

  
February. Another month, another phase of the moon. The guilt has displaced all her hidden protections against unhappiness. Her dreams are nightmares because they are memories of the war. All they need is a little alteration and suddenly Ron is dead, Harry is blinded and rambling nonsense for the rest of his days. Or Tonks turned out to be a traitor, or Professor Lupin got ripped apart by Fenrir. Or any number of horrors that could happen, and so many horrors that did happen.

Ron says, "Please rest a little, Hermione."

Harry says, "We miss you."

Ginny says, "You're breaking both your hearts, you bloody bitch!"

And slaps her.

Hermione wants to say _the moon doesn't have a heart_ but her cheek stings too much, and Ginny looks angry enough to slap her again. Little Ginny Weasley is all grown up now, waiting for Harry to heal but having no patience for anyone else. She is a sunburst like her brother, but hot and deadly enough to raise marks on Hermione's skin. She had forgotten that Ginny and Luna grew close during their sixth year at Hogwarts, had forgotten that Ginny becomes ferocious when defending her loved ones. Someone always has to be a Gryffindor lion, it's a rule.

Ginny says, "Get her a present for Valentine's Day."

Hermione says, "I will."

  
\--

  
What do you get for the girl who has everything but ordinary taste in, well, anything?

Chocolate brings back too many painful memories. Luna makes her own jewelry and Hermione isn't good at fashioning things by hand--that's what magic is for. She is poring over cards in Hogsmeade when the idea descends upon her like a moon goddess stepping out of the sky and walking the earth some starry night, something ancient people used to dream of.

Valentine's Day is a stupid custom. It's for stupid people. Love ought to be for every day, not just one day a year. It's ridiculous.

Hermione is terrified as she gets out of bed that morning, terrified as she brushes the short little curls that have begun to grow back, terrified as she dresses in nothing outside the norm. Just any other day, just another. An other. It's so other that she wants to die. Misery.

Breakfast has a distinctly pink and red theme, and there are little explosions of glitter when the magical cards get a bit too enthusiastic. Hugging herself, not steeling herself because she is making herself so terribly exposed, Hermione walks over to the Ravenclaw table, blue like the shadows of the moon.

Luna has festooned herself with daffodils for the occasion, never mind that they aren't real and aren't in season and don't match any of the colors. She blinks when Hermione pulls her to her feet, and in that blink somehow confides every fear and doubt. The moon in love is especially perilous, something constant in something so used to change.

"I have a present for you," Hermione says.

And Hermione

kisses

Luna

right there for everyone to see, because the moon deserves the attention of all the stars in the sky, even if just for a little while.

And Hermione was never content with just pieces of the moon.

It's the whole that means something.


End file.
